ABSTRACT
The purpose of this chapter is to explore the tourist experience might be enhanced by tour-guiding learning that emphasizes place-based content for a better engagement to a place. Old cemeteries contain a lot of histories related to a place; however, people seldom perceive a cemetery as something that can be utilized to nurture the sense of place and enhance the tourist experience. In addition, cemetery tourism typically focuses more on individual famous personalities rather than seeing the cemetery as a ‘history documentation’ related to a place. Hence, this chapter aims to fill this gap. Bukit China, the oldest and largest traditional Chinese cemetery of the world, which is located in Melaka, a UNESCO Word Heritage Site (WHS) of Malaysia, is the location of the study described in the chapter. Eight documents, which include three interview transcripts, a guided tour observation, a book, a cultural map and two articles were used for content analysis. Five themes emerged: Cemetery’s visual attributes; its functions; its restructuring through time; its meanings from different perspectives; and, critical reflexivity. These themes, together with 12 subthemes and 25 concepts can be used as a guideline of tour-guiding learning to a cemetery, for a better understanding of a place, and enhancing tourist experience in a WHS.
